Twin, closely related themes which are familiar to employees of manufacturing companies are: “reduce costs” and “conserve resources.” Obviously, the two mandates are not mutually exclusive.
Packages with increased compressive strength attributable to an increase in the number of corners are known. For instance, a lightweight octagonal bottle is known from Giblin et al. U.S. Pat. No. 6,464,106. One advantage of increased compressive strength is that the amount of material used in the package may be minimized, thereby conserving resources and lowering cost.
Octagonal cartons and trays are also known. As with bottles, a reported advantage is to increase compressive strength and to permit minimization of packaging materials used in the walls of the container. Unfortunately, octagonal cartons and trays can be difficult to make and utilize significant amounts of packaging resources.
Quaintance US Patent Application Publication No. US 2003/0019920 is directed to a container having more than four sides and constructed to have improved stacking strength and resistance to distortion when transverse forces are applied to the ends or sides of the tray. Embodiments with eight sides are disclosed. Prior art eight sided boxes or trays are said to be formed from a unitary blank of corrugated paperboard.
Drager U.S. Pat. No. 6,223,978 discloses an octagonal package, especially for round items such as pizza. Drager mentions that round packages are available but that many of these have weak vertical structural strength which is said to limit the stackability of the packages because they cannot support the weight of several packages stacked onto each other. The Drager octagonal package includes a bottom and a cover hinged thereto. The cover includes side walls and a locking flap for securing the cover in the closed position onto the bottom. The bottom includes two side walls, a front wall and a rear wall, as well as bridging panels which hingedly interconnect the front wall and the rear wall to each side wall. The bridging panels fold into corners providing vertical structural strength and cause the rear, front and side walls to erect as a unit.
Quintance U.S. Pat. No. Des. 361,892 discloses an eight-sided poultry box.
Wozniacki U.S. Pat. No. 4,417,686 is directed to a tray with extensions which serve as corner reinforcements to prevent buckling.
Meech U.S. Pat. No. 495,421 is directed to a fruit box. The box has 6 or more sides.
Quaintance U.S. Pat. No. 5,752,648 discloses a web-bottomed eight sided tray.
Sieffert U.S. Pat. No. 4,391,371 discloses a fiberboard container for the shipment of fragile and irregularly shaped articles. The container may include a sleeve having an octagonal shape.
Eagle Custom Packaging Systems Internet website, www.eaglecustompackaging.com/SELFLOCK-ns4.html discloses an octagon self locking tray erector and an octagonal self locking tray and blank.
Eight corner containers are produced on Meta Systems' machines which are HSC (half slotted cartons) box formers. Meta Systems equipment can be found at www.smurfit-stone.com/content/meta system.asp.
Despite the disclosure of several 8-sided cartons in the literature, there is still a need for an 8-sided carton which can be readily erected.